GAPGAS (Oct 2016) – So You Really Want To Be A YouTube Star?

Video is so on trend right now even our Head Honcho, Rob, is getting into the spirit of things!

Last night he joined our flagship event GAPGAS! (Got a Problem? -> Get a Solution!) live on stage via video link up from the Dominican Republic, where he is engrossed in building “Buena Vista Start-up Club”, a co-work/live/play space in the Caribbean where the digital nomads amongst us can work on their businesses, be they tech startups, social media, PR, platforms; whatever’s your poison; in peace, and solitude, or amongst like-minded fellow founders and a network of mentors rich in life experience.

Sounds good right? We’ll just let that idea sink in for a moment…

Now back to a rainy night in London, a Monday to boot, but never fear, HHH were here to brighten things up by inviting startup founders on stage to vent on the problems their businesses are experiencing and have them crowd-solved by you, our intrepid, incisive and instinctively right audience! The initiated amongst you know this as GAPGAS!

Last night we lined up two awesome talks for you beginning with Zsolt Farkas who went into seriously granular levels of detail about the power of Facebook Marketing. And boy is it powerful – Zsolt has divided his time between Budapest and Silicon Valley for the past five years and has uncovered the beating heart of the science which is what made his presentation so fascinating – these were actionable hints and tips that you can start using today! Here goes:

Use A/B Testing to find what works – you can transform your CPC metrics if you are consistently hitting the right target audience so experimentation is key – your perfect audience has always been out there – now you can find them!

Build your audience! – keep feeding them information and ads to keep them in the loop with what you are doing. Re-market to your audience – this means showing users the same brand 3 or 4 times instead of just once if they have previously shown an interest. Practise Direct Targeting also.

Thank you Zsolt, you seem like a pretty handy guy to know – welcome to the HHH family!

Moving on, moving on, (we had so much to get through last night I’ve hardly got time to squeeze in my unusually witty repartee), next up we sat spellbound as Daniel Colbert, aka CameraDan, presented a “Beginner’s Guide To YouTube Marketing”.

Daniel has been making YouTube videos for as long as he can remember and has been behind some serious success stories – racking up millions of YouTube views and crucially, helping his clients to monetise effectively and efficiently – so how is it done?

We cannot lay it all out here because frankly Daniel’s knowledge is encyclopaedic – I don’t think an audience has ever absorbed so much information – but here are some potted highlights:

Find your ideal viewer! This involves analysing every aspect of your ideal viewer’s personality and habits. What are they like? What do they do on Saturday night? Where do they shop? What’s their favourite food. Go beyond what you think is strictly necessary and you will reap the rewards.

Look at the types of video you release! there are two types you must be recording; the Traffic video – this is the one you hope will “go viral” and the ones that gets shared and gets the punters heading to your YouTube channel.

The second video is the Conversion video – this is the one your viewers and fans will watch after they have watched a couple of your best known traffic videos – and this is where you can pitch your paid services to your fans, or upsell a particular service or product.

That’s how it’s done folks – the conversion video can be anything up to 7 minutes long – after all you have a lot you want to tell your newly found captive audience right? But the traffic video – keep it short and don’t let it get boring! You must keep people engaged right from the get-go.

For more information, CameraDan is here for you – welcome to the family Dan!

Amazing stuff – and we still haven’t got to the meat and drink of the night folks – the doner kebab of discussions, with the perfect blend of stringy lettuce, chili sauce, onions and huge tender chunks of succulent lamb shish.

Sheesh, it was good last night! Highlights roll below:

Dwight Harris was launching his own international business working with business leaders to help them with their marketing needs. Dwight needs a platform, created by a CTO or a technical team perhaps, before he can begin to engage with business leaders. Was anyone in the audience willing to help Dwight?

Indeed they were, CTO searches can be conducted through sites like F6S, Unicorn Hunt from the 3 Beards, and heck – on the message board at Google Campus café is probably a pretty good place to start!

Elena Corchero; HHH regular Elena Corchero is launching a Product Consultancy aimed at discovering more creative and technical female entrepreneurs and founders. It’s called Go Steam! And will feature a YouTube channel “exploring the integration of the “A” Arts in to STEM to form STEAM encouraging the public to embrace technology and science into their everyday lives and career paths.” Besides working with Unruly, Elena is looking for more opportunities to discover new female entrepreneurs – best places to look?

Check out Future Girl Corp; founded by Georgina Harding, who used to work for Mario Testino agency Higher and Higher, Future Girl Corp wants to help Future Female CEO’s – a great place to start, we hope you will agree.

Jen is a part-time teacher, part-time entrepreneur. Inspired by her Anglo/Jewish/Asian upbringing Jen has founded a YouTube channel Girltribe to interview, for example, women making waves in the music industry. Jen needs help with blogger outreach, databases where she can reach a target audience of 15-30 year old females. And also wanted to know about use of famous artists’ music in her videos – what are the legal repercussions?

Blogger databases are easy – try BloggersRequired.com, or Vuelio.com, or keep hitting up the HHH community – its chock full of copywriters, bloggers, commentators and marketing and PR experts.
And according to the Dan the “Camera” man yes you can get into trouble for using other artist’s music in your videos – you can have your channel closed down – but there are sites where you can buy licenses to as little as just a few seconds of artist’s songs. Or, as one HHH’er pointed out cleverly, you could try Jukedeck, a site that lets you create your own music in just a few seconds. It’s unique, tailored, and royalty free – what’s not to like?

Pranna from UCL is also interested in building out his video channel showcasing the skills and interests of up and coming content superstars – and he wants to introduce a Tinder style user interface to help people discover the videos they really want to see, faster!

Answers ranged from “Keep coming to HHH events!” And “Put yourself Out There, make sure everybody knows who you are”And as if by magic, one audience member decided they wanted to meet Pranna later – “it’s a match!”, as presenter Laura wittily pointed out ; )

Connor has founded a Charity called Bettering Education that helps students and young people develop their soft skills and give themselves a better chance in the jobs market. Connor attended with two young YouTube starlets who already run successful YouTube channels – Connor is also interested in developing a VR aspect to video creation and wanted to know where he can reach out for further funding.

Zedek from the Czech Republic is founder of a startup we believe is called Afterlife, for all your late night party and going out needs – it’s easy to use, gives you a meeting point, and when you arrive it surprises you with suggested destinations. How about that?

Zedek was looking for feedback and although his idea is early stage, he found some – time to build out that MVP and get that thing out there, Zedek!

Ross from CrewDo has launched a platform to help people book film crews and is thinking about marketing the service on YouTube – the trouble is, to attract the right clients he knows he will need top quality produced video clips – thoughts please HHH’ers?

Don’t lose sight of the concept either, someone suggested; “try to think of the process of a fun game and a way to attract new customers in an engaging way”.“Get an iPhone, shoot the film with the camera – keep it short – insert some memes, keep the energy up and the content solid, and feed people a message that’s cool!” Good advice, not so easy to follow.Other answers included trying to film with famous people and celebs and partnering with PR Agencies who can find you access to the right channels and audiences.

Lincoln has helped develop an app that will help to take you on a musical journey, recommending songs to add your playlist as you struggle to think of what to listen to next.

Banish the thought of that ever happening again thanks to Lincoln! But how can he find a reliable coder who can send him back the code he needs to make his magic work – should he outsource or find a more permanent partner?Freelancer.com is great for hiring coders (so is Upwork) but maybe Lincoln feels that this is too much like outsourcing. Keep tapping into the HHH talent pool Lincoln, the perfect CTO is out there just waiting to meet you – next time you’ll be lucky. Make it snappy, Devs!

Tech based solutions for mental health issues; Caitlyn, one of our wonderful new-ish presenters (Rob has been away so long!) wants to build a community around this concept, and it is, I think we’ll all agree, a powerful and emotive subject and surely an area we would all give of our time willingly to help develop. So watch this space and look out for news from Caitlyn.

And finally – thought we’d never get here – if you’ve read this far – kudos to you! You’ll thank us for it one day, we promise ; )
Our last founder was building a cycling app and needed to know about the insurance side of tech – where can we go to learn more about or even participate in all things insure-tech related?

You’ll never run out of support for your startup in London, Brexit or (hopefully) no Brexit. The tech eco-system is just so strong. And the best place to hear about it all, and to live it, vicariously or otherwise? Why HHH of course!